The actress’s husband — musician Keith Urban — made the trip from Sydney, where’s he’s been filming The Voice, to escort her up the famous Palais stairs at the Cannes Film Festival for the screening of her film, The Paperboy.

And Kidman says his effort meant “everything” to her: “As long as he’s there, he’s my rock, everything’s fine. I feel a little out to sea if he’s not there.”

Not that she didn’t know what she was doing. It’s the star’s fifth time in Cannes, so she’s used to the huge photo calls, press conferences and international interviews in the palm-tree scattered French coastal resort.

This time Kidman had two movies showing — The Paperboy and Hemingway & Gellhorn.

“We got an amazing standing ovation (for Paperboy), which was great. This is my fifth time so I’ve had many, many different reactions,” she said in an interview on Saturday. “That’s the longest standing ‘O’ I’ve ever gotten at Cannes.”

“Lee was crying, but I wasn’t crying. I cry at my kids, I cry with my family, I don’t really cry outside of that — that’s the stuff that brings me to tears!” Kidman said. “All of this other stuff, the glitter, and those sort of things, I’m more immune to at this stage. It’s probably because I’ve been doing it for so long.”

She credits putting showbiz further down her list of priorities with keeping her relationship on an even keel, even if it does involve a lot of international travel.

“Keith and I have been at this for a long time. We know where it all stands, so there’s kind of a practicality in a sense,” she explained.

While that doesn’t sound very romantic, Kidman says they manage to keep it going, even on the road.

“We can have a really cool life together because that’s what matters. In terms of romance, for us, that’s so much more important than any of this,” she says, gesturing to the lights and the cameras pointing at her.